


Adore

by robotsdance



Category: Frasier (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-06-01 11:58:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15142577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/robotsdance/pseuds/robotsdance
Summary: Niles doesn’t mind the rough stuff. Not one bit.





	Adore

**Author's Note:**

> “You’ve never minded the rough stuff before” is a canon line and I can’t believe I have to write this myself.

Daphne catches Niles admiring the scratches she left on his chest in the mirror and she steps closer to him so that both of their reflections look back at them. “Oh dear,” she chuckles sheepishly as she catches his eye, “Guess I got carried away. I’m-”

“Don’t apologize!” Niles blurts out in a panic before he traces the path of the clearest mark on his torso with reverence, “Don’t you dare.”

Daphne grins, slow and warm and suggestive. She leans over his shoulder and kisses his cheek, but after she does he turns his head so she can kiss him properly so she does, languid and loving and a tad possessive. He makes a little noise when she breaks the kiss before he was ready but she stays close, “Maybe next time I’ll…”

She greatly enjoys the way he has to steady himself on the counter to stay upright as she describes just a hint of what she’d like to do to him.

*

Niles is on top but not for long. Daphne flips him over and pins his left wrist to the mattress above his head and he inhales sharply as he stills under her touch.

He gazes up at her, all want and need and love and lust, and she both holds still and holds his wrist still, waiting for him to react, to say something, to make a move, because she needs to know what he wants before she does anything else. Sex is still so new between them that every encounter is still full of discovery and they haven’t done anything like this yet. Maybe he’s not ready. Maybe this isn’t something he enjoys… But the expression on his face is one of utmost shock and delight that reads nothing at all like “stop I don’t like this” and a lot more like “please don’t ever stop”, so she holds his wrist and gives him as much time as he needs to respond to what she’s proposing.

Niles doesn’t say a word, he just continues to look right at her as he brings his other hand up and places it beside the wrist she is still holding down.

Arousal jolts through her with such intensity that her hand trembles as she loosens her grasp on him enough for him to slip his other wrist under her hand. She leans forward, pressing his wrists into the mattress with her bodyweight, and it must hurt, at least a little, but his head tilts back as his eyes flutter closed in ecstasy. She’s suspected this about him for years, but she had no idea, absolutely no idea, that he would respond so beautifully.

She’s smiling at him and she knows it. She can’t hide her delight at this mutual discovery any more than he can, which is fine by her. Daphne wants him to know exactly how much she is enjoying this already so she leans down closer to him, squeezing his wrists a little as she does and revelling the way he reacts to the extra pressure with an awed gasp of her name.

Her grin widens.

This is going to be so much fun.

*

They fuck against his fancy apartment door that they just barely managed to close behind them, still mostly dressed but desperate enough to make it happen as soon as they remove the bare minimum amount of clothing. Their night out had been a torturously long period of time in which they couldn’t have sex (though don’t think she hadn’t thought about dragging him into the restroom of that posh restaurant and having her way with him), so they had spent the whole time speaking in subtext and innuendo, every word of it a declaration of utmost intent. They’d opted to skip dessert but their meal still took a small eternity, and then traffic coming back had been a nightmare. Hell, even the elevator in his building had gone so far as to threaten to break down (it held still between the 5th and 6th floors for long enough for Niles to have his finger poised over the emergency button and for Daphne to declare that she was going to have him in the next three minutes, and if this elevator was where it happened so be it. Niles had been so stunned and aroused by the prospect he’d failed to push the emergency button but the elevator carried them to their destination without further delay).

And so they’d made it into the apartment, but not a step further, before they made good on the promises they’d been making all evening.

“Why did we go out at all?” Niles asks, right after, breathless and spent as he collapses against her.

She laughs as aftershocks of her orgasm still ripple through her as she holds him against her and plays with the hair on the back of his neck with one hand as he laces his fingers with her other hand.

As much as she’s looking forward to getting a good look at him in the aftermath to admire his pants around his ankles, his tie askew, his hair a mess, and her lipstick on his collar with a sense of distinct pride, for now she wants to feel his heart beating in his chest against her own for a while longer so she pulls him closer and he sways into her embrace.

*

She walks into his kitchen and when he turns to greet her he drops the spatula he’s holding and it clatters to the ground though he doesn’t seem to notice the noise.

“Daphne,” he gushes, not the least bit bothered by the cooking utensil on the floor, still not looking anywhere but at her, “You look stunning.”

She looks down in bemusement, half-expecting to find herself wearing something other than his dress shirt haphazardly buttoned and her knickers which she’d kicked off the night before and had to retrieve them from where they had landed. She hasn’t even brushed her hair yet.

“You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen,” he breathes as she walks towards him.

“Yes I’m sure I’m a real vision,” she laughs as she kisses him good morning.

“You are,” he says as he leans in to kiss her again. He’s grinning at her in the way she’s already learned to associate with good things to come and sure enough there’s more than a casual greeting in his kiss.

“The stove is on,” she murmurs against his lips.

“Good point,” he replies against her neck, his voice low and rough, as he reaches behind his back to turn off the offending appliance without looking at it, “Better?”

She laughs as she pulls him closer, “Much.”

*

Niles, bless his heart, bruises like a peach and scratches so easily she could carve her name into his skin and see it for days afterwards. He would let her too, he’s told her as much. He’d love nothing more than to have “Property of Daphne Moon” etched across him. He loves when she leaves marks across his body and she loves the way he will not-so-subtly delight in mapping every bruise and scratch she’s given him afterwards.

Once and a while she will touch a place on his body where she knows his suit is covering a bruise she left when they’re out in public to watch the flicker of pain make him starry-eyed.

*

They hit the floor with an almighty thud and after a few shocked seconds in which they ask each other if they are okay enough times to confirm that there are no injuries between them they start laughing and quickly find it difficult to stop. Through their giggles they try to reconstruct the events that led them to be lying on the floor beside the bed in a tangle of expensive sheets but every step towards clarity circles back into them laughing and laughing and laughing.

When they’re getting dressed the following morning they realize they have matching bruises on opposite hips to commemorate their sudden and unplanned journey to the hardwood floor, which they think is funny, but it isn’t until they’re both at Dr. Crane’s cooking breakfast for the family that they accidentally bump into each other in such a way that they are both reminded of the circumstances that led to their mirroring injuries, which they find hilarious.

Dr. Crane happens to walk into the kitchen to catch them taking turns hip-checking each other and jointly reeling away from each other in pain as they make no effort to contain their laughter. Dr. Crane looks like he’s going to say something but seems to think better of it. Instead his eyes narrow in judgement that only makes Niles and Daphne giggle harder as they lean against one another to stay upright, their bruised hips still brushing against each other, the dull echo of pain enough to have them losing all composure the way they did on the floor beside Niles’ bed all over again.

*

Niles is practically sobbing as he twists against the sheets, clutching desperately at her as if afraid she’s going to vanish. She stays with him, grinding her hips down and letting him anchor himself to her, even as they both know he’s moments away from losing any and all semblance of control. She leans down to kiss him to taste his desperation first hand. She loves when he is torn between the two extremes that overtake him when he’s right on the verge: Hold On. Let Go.

Ultimately she knows he will do both: Hold on to her as he lets go and surrenders to the orgasm he’s been trying to postpone and she loves nothing more than getting to be the one to tear him apart and hold him together as pleasure overrides his senses.

*

“If you let go of the headboard,” she says as she trails her finger down his chest, “I stop. Understood?”

He nods and holds on for dear life.

*

Tonight he is on his knees in front of her and she traces his jaw from his ear to his chin barely making contact before she uses two fingers to apply a fraction more pressure to see just how little guidance he needs to obey her every whim tonight. She grins with satisfaction when he tilts his head back to look at her after only the softest change in touch from her, his gaze steady and awed as he looks up at her with rapturous attention.

The command she’s about to give feels like almost too much, like there’s too much truth in it somehow. They’ve made peace with their history, the fantasy she represented to him for so long: the Goddess he could love but not touch, but that doesn’t mean they can’t have a little fun with it now and then… Niles is waiting for her to tell him what she wants tonight, exactly what she wants. She asked for control of their encounter tonight a few minutes ago and he gave it to her without hesitation. Her wish is his command. She just needs to get the words out.

“Niles,” she says. There’s emotion in her voice and a want that’s so acute it’s almost a need, and she can see him responding to the tone in her voice already, the honesty he can feel before she even manages to get the words out. His eyes are clear and he is ready and waiting (of course he is, one of his longest running wishes is being under her command like this) so she steadies her nerves and asks for what she wants from him tonight in hardly more than a whisper, “Worship me.”

His eyes light up like he’s never heard a more wonderful request in his life.

*

She comes so hard again his mouth that she’s seeing stars, the rush of pleasure crashing over her in waves that she rides out while Niles trails kisses across her inner thigh. He hums softly as he surfaces to make eye contact, looking up her body as she's laid out on his fainting couch and grinning at the sight of her dress bunched up around her waist, “I’ve been thinking about this all day.”

“All day huh?” she teases as she runs her fingers through his hair.

“MmHmm,” he murmurs against her skin, “I’m still thinking about it.”

He’s still fully dressed, save his suit jacket which she managed to rid him of before he took control. The sight of him between her thighs in the suit he wore all day, no doubt hard as hell in his trousers but still working his way back down her body for round two makes her want to grab him by his braces and throw him onto the obscenely expensive rug and have her way with him.

She’s still hyper-sensitive from her first orgasm so when his tongue makes contact she jolts with pleasure and she can feel him smiling against her.

“Niles,” she says, or rather gasps, but he is already committing himself whole-heartedly to his task and doesn’t respond in words, so she says his name again.

He looks up.

“I think,” she pauses both for effect and also to give herself time to form a coherent sentence, “It’s my turn to show you what I’ve been thinking about all day.”

*

“Can you….” he says between kisses as he squirms with nervous excitement that she finds endearing to the point of wanting to speed this process up a little because she knows whatever he’s about to say involves them both getting naked and she’s very much in the mood to get that part of their evening sooner rather than later. But Niles is still grasping to string words together, “Uh… maybe….maybe tonight you could… you could…maybe…”

“Niles,” she says as she touches the side of his face with her hand, her voice clear and soft enough to calm him, “You know you can ask me for what you want.”

She watches him internalize what she has said and the tension in his body releases its grip on him somewhat, and he nods. It’s not the first time she’s told him this, and it won’t be last. He still needs reassurance about this and her chest aches for him that he’s never had this sort of relationship before: where his needs and wants and desires are as important as his partner’s.

He kisses her then and she kisses him back and when he’s ready he asks her for exactly what he wants.

*

He lies down beside her and traces patterns of infinity on her skin, starting at her collar bone and slowly working his way down her body towards where she most needs to be touched right now. He is so gentle she nearly sobs, his slender fingers on her skin and his lips ghosting across her own are the exact opposite of the way she had been smacking him around only minutes before.

Her hand is still tingling from the spanking she gave him, and no doubt his arse is still red, probably already well into forming bruises that will remind him of every time he gasped and told her “Harder” when he sits down on one of the unforgiving chairs at Cafe Nervosa for at least the next two days. The thought of him carrying this encounter with him in such a way makes her want him even more, the need of it burning through her. She needs him to touch her, now, not in whatever leisurely timeframe he’s decided upon. She squirms, trying to encourage him to hurry up. She’s so worked up she knows it won’t take much to send her over the edge, but he’s taking his sweet time regardless.

“Niles.” It’s a whine and a whimper and there’s no mistaking the shameless need in her voice.

He hums thoughtfully as his fingers skim across her ribcage before he answers her. “Daphne,” his voice is soft and sweet, “Let me do this for you.”

She exhales as slowly as she is able, knowing he can feel her heart pounding under his hand. He kisses her again and she feels her body surrendering to whatever pleasures he’s about to give her, at whatever tormenting pace he’s determined to set.

The build up is exquisite agony and by the end she’s trembling with tension and incoherent with need. She’s long since lost the use of every word that isn’t “Niles” or “Please” but those are the only words in the universe that even begin to express what she’s feeling right now so she repeats them over and over and over and over and over and over until he finally finally finally gives her exactly what she needs.

*

Their safeword comes out of his mouth in a desperate gasp and she stops what she’s doing immediately and leans down to push the blindfold up onto his forehead so she can see his eyes but before she can ask a single question to check in he’s already reassuring her that he’s okay. “I’m fine Daphne. I’m fine. I just got a little…” he doesn’t take his eyes off her as he waits for the word to come to him, “overwhelmed.”

“Are you sure?” she asks, still worried, “What do you need right now? I can get you a glass of water if you like?”

He reaches for her hand and holds it, “Really I’m fine.” he squeezes her fingers, “Stay here.”

She nods and rolls off him so she’s lying beside him, still holding his hand and he turns so he’s lying on his side looking back at her. They are quiet for a few long moments in which he tucks her hair behind her ear, and then trails his fingers down her shoulder to her hip before tracing his way back up to her shoulder and then down her arm so he can hold her hand again.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asks after a while, “It doesn’t have to be now. ”

“The blindfold…” he says carefully, “Didn’t work for me.”

“So we won’t use it again,” she says as she gives his hand a reassuring squeeze. The blindfold had been his idea in the first place, his tie had gotten half-stuck on his head when she went to remove it one time and he had grinned at the possibilities which he had later asked to explore more thoroughly. If it didn’t work for him, it didn’t work for him. They won’t do that again unless he wants to.

He isn’t done though, still struggling to articulate what he is feeling, starting and stopping a few times before he finally says only, “I like to be able to see you.”

"Okay," she smiles at him. Leave it to Niles to make her feel like the centre of his universe even when they’re talking about him.

*

She rakes her fingers across his shoulders for the simple pleasure of watching his knees buckle while they’re waiting for their coffee. How had she gone so long without noticing the power she has over him?

*

Sweat cools on their skin as the air from the fan at the foot of the bed oscillates back and forth over their (now) parallel bodies. Despite the oppressive warmth of the room thanks to the fluke late in the season heat wave goosebumps rise on her flesh. Between the chill on her skin and the rush of endorphins still flowing through her body she is as content as can be. Beside her Niles is lying on his back with eyes closed, his whole body relaxed to the point of absolute bliss.

“Remember the other heat wave?” she asks.

Niles laughs, “Vividly.”

She considers him for a moment, “What do you think would have happened if we’d gone through with it?”

“Oh I dunno…”

“C’mon Niles,” she teases, “I know you thought about it.”

“That’s putting it mildly.”

She grins at him, “If it helps, I thought about it too.”

“Really?”

“Of course.”

“So what do you think would have happened if we’d gone through with it?” he asks, turning her question back on her.

“Well, I don’t know what you would have done, but if we had half as good a time then as we do now, I would have wanted to do it again. I would have come back.”

“You think so?”

“MmHmm,” she confirms, “We could have snuck around for a while.” She’s teasing him now, knowing exactly what she’s doing to him, but there’s truth in it too, “Kept it a secret, snuck off when no one would notice where we were…”

“Oh my God.”

“Wondering if we were making a huge mistake every time but everything feeling so good we wouldn’t be able to stop, surrendering to the sex like it was inevitable, like it was meant to happen between us. And now that we’d started we wouldn’t be able to stop.”

“Oh my God.”

“And I would be terrified that I was taking advantage of our friendship. That you were too polite to tell me that you didn’t want to keep doing this.”

“Daphne, I never in a million years would have wanted to stop-“

“I know that now,” she laughs, “But I didn’t then.”

“I would have told you.”

“You think so?”

“It would have come out. Even if I didn’t say it right away, you would have figured it out. If we’d slept together that night… God Daphne, if you think I would have been anything other than desperately, obviously in love with you from the get go…”

He sighs.

“That night,” Niles says after some consideration, “You would have had to make the first move.”

“As I recall I did,” she laughs at the notion that this could be a revelation, “And then the second and probably the fourth.”

“But we were still in the realm of plausible deniability,” Niles points out, “But if you had kissed me…”

“I very nearly did.”

They are quiet for a few long moments as the fan continues to cool their sticky skin.

“If we’d had sex then, do you think we would have ended up together?” Niles asks.

“I hope so,” Daphne says without hesitation, “God I hope so.”

“Me too.”

*

She drags her nails across his back as she lifts her knees closer to her chest and tells him to fuck her harder. His hands are firm on her hips as he pulls her closer to him and then goes about his assigned task with utmost dedication and she’s so close she could come in about a second if he just-

She arches off the mattress so hard that her chest presses up against his as he fucks her through it, and the collisions of sensation are so strong that all she can do is claw at his back hard enough to draw blood as he moans in pleasure-pain and relents to his own release.

*

He still says her name like he can’t believe he gets to say it like this. Like he might wake up. Like he’s died and gone to heaven already.

*

She can taste his devotion on his tongue as she kisses him, her hand gripping the hair on the back of his head holding him firmly in place. When she pulls back from the kiss (just a little, just enough to make him follow) she tightens her grip and holds him still and whispers her command:

“Wait.”

He obeys, his focus never drifting or wavering. He is under her spell completely. Already. Always.

She loves him so much.

When she decides it’s time she shoves him backwards onto the bed and he falls without any attempt to break or guide his fall, trusting her to put him exactly where she needs him to be right now.

She has no idea what she did to deserve him. How could anyone love her so much? There is love in everything he does for her. She spent years not seeing it, but now that she does the truth of it still overwhelms her every day.

He loves her.

It’s the same truth that terrified her when Dr. Crane accidentally blurted out Niles’ secret. The same truth that tormented her for months, back when she knew how he felt but Niles did not know that she knew. The truth that forced her to question everything she thought she knew about her own heart.

The truth that led them to risk everything for each other:

They’re in love.

And now they get to live that truth openly, every day, for the rest of their lives.

She has no idea how they got so lucky but she’s determined to enjoy it fully. And right now that involves bringing Niles to the brink of what he can endure with love that’s equal parts compassionate and unforgiving until he’s incoherent with desire and unable to do more than beg her for release and then making him wait just a little bit longer.

She can’t wait to get started, her body already overrun with arousal, which isn’t a good headspace to be in for the type of endurance event she wants to put him through so she straddles his face and lets him get to work on giving her the orgasm that will clear her head enough to get on with what she has planned for him.

*

Going out dancing is a simple concept for a date, but one they both love. It’s easy and familiar and still as joyful as the first time. The dance lessons in the living room are as much a cherished memory as the resulting evening out at the Snow Ball, and that is where Daphne finds her thoughts drifting to as she and Niles enter the immaculately decorated venue: that week they spent dancing beside the coffee table and Mr. Crane’s chair. Niles finding his feet and his confidence, the casual intimacy of their closeness that she didn’t bother to examine until years later. If she’d been paying more attention to what she was doing, maybe she would have had an easier time admitting what she was feeling later on. Because she wasn’t in love with him then, not yet, but there was so much love in her actions, and she’s not just thinking about the kiss she thought was a performance at the time. From then, and even earlier, there was so much affection in their friendship, in ways that even then were exclusive to Niles, though she took what their friendship was for granted for years.

She doesn’t take it for granted now.

Perhaps Niles is also taking a little wander down memory lane because he is grinning at her with that look of slight disbelief that his life is now filled with moments like this.

She squeezes his wrist, firm pressure for a second and she feels the immediate shift in his demeanour as his focus, which was already centred on her, sharpens to the point where she’s certain he couldn’t point out simple details of the room like the location of the coat check or the emergency exits at this moment should she care to ask him such a question. She loves how easy it is.

“Tonight,” she says, her voice low and just for him, “Follow my lead.”

His knees weaken but he manages to compose himself, “With pleasure Daphne.”


End file.
